


rivalry

by heejinsoul



Category: Criminal Minds (US TV)
Genre: Angst, F/M, Fluff, Fluff and Angst, Humor, Making Out, Spencer Reid is my emotional support character, definitely making out, honestly idk how to tag, lol, maybe some smut, please enjoy this its gonna have quite a few chapters
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-08-04
Updated: 2020-08-08
Packaged: 2021-03-06 02:08:43
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 4,986
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25705651
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/heejinsoul/pseuds/heejinsoul
Summary: Y/n is two years out of college, being the mere age of 20 since she is a young genius. Recently being placed in the behavioral analysis unit in quantico, she enjoys getting to know the team. Each member, except for one. Spencer Reid. Everytime you’re in a room with him, it always seems like he’s trying to outsmart you, prove you wrong, or just be better than you in general. Why does he always want to get on your nerves?
Relationships: Spencer Reid/Original Female Character(s), Spencer Reid/Reader, Spencer Reid/You
Comments: 5
Kudos: 44





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> yo yo yo idk this is my first fan fiction please don't bully me ok ;-;

You’d always wanted to go into law enforcement. From a young age, you had always wanted to help people. You were fascinated with superheroes, and completely distraught when your mother told you that all your favorite superheroes were, in fact, fictional. So, you decided on the next best thing, and decided it would do.

Growing up as an only child with a single parent was hard. You loved your mother, of course, but other kids never wanted to talk to you or hang out with you. They said you were weird. You liked to think that it was because they were jealous of your smarts, and it turns out that was the case. After beating your first grade teacher on a multiplication problem challenge (with no calculators), you found yourself being tested and ultimately skipping a few grades. You were nine when you finished elementary school, spent ages 10-11 in middle school, 12-15 in high school, and completed a four year college degree in half the time. You were eighteen when you finished college, and immediately applied for the FBI. 

You were accepted to be an agent, and in your two years there, you made your way up the ranks to the BAU, exactly where you wanted to be. You had only been with your team for one week, and you loved the dynamics. Each and every member had their purpose. Penelope Garcia, the expert in technology, who you wouldn’t be able to solve cases without. Jennifer Jeareau, or JJ, was the communicator and press liaison. You wouldn’t even have cases if it wasn’t for her. Emily Prentiss, the badass profiler, and one hell of a boss. Derek Morgan, who can crack a joke at any time (whether deemed appropriate or not). Aaron Hotchner and David Rossi, the leaders of the team, and the ones who brought order to the BAU.

And then there was Spencer Reid, and you, y/n l/n. This confused you, as you both seemed to serve the same purpose. You were both young, insanely smart and talented profilers, who did the exact same thing. This caused a sort of rivalry to form between the two of you, instigated by him. You were intent on being friends with each member of your new team, but the idea of a friendship with Spencer flew out the window when he accused you of lying about your iq. 

“What do you mean, that’s impossible?” You questioned, as you shot him an accusing look.

“I mean, there is no way your iq is that high.” Spencer returned your question with this, and then continued to ramble off statistics about how it was highly unlikely you were that smart considering your age group and gender. You didn’t even listen to half of his reasons, cutting him off because you were getting infuriated that he had the audacity to insinuate that he was smarter than you just because he was a man.

“Are you sure, Spencer?” You interrupted him. He turned to you in surprise, not expecting you to cut him off like that. 

“Are you sure that I couldn’t be that smart? Are you sure that the statistics say that I can’t have an iq of 185?”

“I didn’t say it was impossible, I merely stated that it would be highly improbable-”

“Because I don’t think this is about statistics, Reid. I think that you’re threatened by the fact that there could be another person in this room that could challenge your level of intelligence, and I think it puts you off even more that said person is younger than you, and not to mention a female.”

Spencer was speechless. Maybe even stunned. You were too, not expecting yourself to be that upfront with him. But you didn’t let that show on your facial expressions.

Not realizing how close you two had gotten during your argument, you immediately felt his looming presence snap you back into reality. You huffed, and backed away from him.

“Cat got your tongue?” You said, as more of a statement rather than a question. 

You didn’t notice the way his adams apple bobbed right before you exited.

Not even thirty minutes later, you were on the jet on the way to another case. This time, located in Saint Louis, Missouri. 

You leaned back in your chair, focusing as JJ debriefed all of you on the case. 

“This unsub is quite organized, learning about his victims before he attacks and kills, and he leaves behind no evidence that he doesn’t want us to find. He’s extremely organized.”

“He seems to be targeting happy young couples, murdering the male first, raping the female, and then killing her too. However, he kills the females almost peacefully, and crosses their arms over them, likely meaning to show signs of regret or remorse. This makes it seem like he wants to take the place of these young men, which means that our unsub is most likely a white male in his twenties or early thirties.” JJ continues. 

The jet lands, and you all file into the black SUVs waiting for you. You immediately choose to ride shotgun with Morgan, knowing that car rides with him are never dull. 

You arrive at the precinct, where you’re all greeted by a detective and the chief of police. They go over the case with all of you, and you all break off into separate groups to cover everything at once. Hotch and Emily head to the first crime scene, JJ and Rossi head to the morgue, which leaves you, Morgan, and Reid to go to the most recent crime scene.

After you all finish inspecting, you meet back up again and discuss what you found. 

“So from what I'm hearing, all we know about our unsub is how he chooses his victims,” JJ says, a worried tone on the edge of her voice.

“Yup,” you answer when nobody else says anything.

“I think the answer is clear on how we’re going to catch this guy,” Rossi says. Everyone looks at him, confused as to where this is going.

“We need to lure him,” he finishes when nobody catches on.

“How are we going to do that?” You question, puzzled on how this was going to work. 

“By giving him exactly what he looks for. A young, happy couple.” Rossi says, and everyone's eyes drift between you and spencer. 

“What?” you say, still clearly not understanding what was going on. 

“Rossi wants us to pose as a happy couple to lure the unsub, y/n,” Spencer quipps, making you realize just exactly what you were going to have to do.

“Oh,” you say softly, mentally smacking yourself that you didn’t realize it sooner. 

That’s how you ended up in a high class restaurant, sitting across from Spencer Reid. He was sitting in the corner of the booth, staring at the menu while you silently watched him. 

Suddenly becoming more aware of why you were here, you reached across the table and placed your hand on his forearm. This startled him, but he relaxed once he realized it was only you. He looked up at you, eyebrows furrowed, and opened his mouth to speak, but you spoke before he even had the opportunity to say anything. 

“If we want the unsub to even think about choosing us, we have to pretend to be happy and in love,” you say, plastering a fake grin on your face. Reid caught on and immediately started playing along. 

“Well, if we’re supposed to be a couple, shouldn’t we be acting like it?” He asks. 

“Precisely my point, Mister Reid,” you say, earning a small chuckle from him.

You both end up ordering food that you know you aren’t going to be able to stomach, but to convince the unsub that you’re a happy couple, you have to make sure there’s nothing suspicious about your behavior.

You see, the team had discovered that the unsub works at a very expensive restaurant called Vicia. He was either a bartender, or on the wait staff. The team had booked you and Reid a reservation so that nothing looked suspicious, and you both had about two hours to try to deduce who the unsub was. Unfortunately for you, there were quite a few young white males working that night. So, the only thing that you could do was act like a lovesick couple and hope that one of them follows you back to your ‘home’, or the safehouse that had been set for the both of you. 

Reid continues to crack jokes the whole night, while you both attempt to stomach your food. As it nears 11pm (the restaurant's closing time), a young man who looks to be a waiter approaches your table. He wasn’t your normal server, as your order had been taken and brought to you by a young latina woman. 

“How are you enjoying your meals? Is there anything I can do for you?” He questions with a classic customer service smile on his face. You give Reid a look, and he immediately understands. 

“Oh no, everything is absolutely perfect! The food was delicious, wasn’t it honey?” Reid boasts to the waiter, and you nod in return.

“Yes of course! My meal was fantastic, but not as fantastic as you,” you wink at him with an almost genuine smile on your face. If this action caught him off guard, he didn’t let it show. 

The waiter smiles watching the exchange, and offers to bring you out some to go boxes. You both agree, not wanting to raise any suspicion. 

As the waiter leaves your table and exits into what seems to be the kitchen, both of your expressions falter as you look towards each other. 

“You thinking what i’m thinking?” you ask Reid.

“If you’re thinking that might be the unsub, then yes, I am thinking what you’re thinking.

The man comes by and places two to-go containers on your table, and then rushes off when he sees another member of the wait staff wave to him. You both place your leftover food into the boxes, not wanting to waste any of the delicious food, and leave a large chunk of cash for the meal and to tip the waitress that served you. 

You exit the restaurant just before closing time, sneaking your hand into Reids as you stroll to the rental car you two were going to use to drive to the house. A government issued sedan would have raised suspicions, after all. He tensed as he felt your warm hand grab his, but he made no visual or verbal reaction. 

“He could be watching us right now, we need to pretend to be in love,” you said through a forced smile, and Reid nods and turns to face you, stopping your stroll. 

“Hey,” he says quickly. You turn to him, confused.

“Hey?” you stare up at him, more than a bit confused.

Reid looked down at you, clearly wanting to say something but refraining from it.

“I- uh, I just wanted to say that you don’t have to be worried. About getting hurt, that is. The team is watching us at all times, they’ve got eyes on us at all times.” Reid says, not making eye contact with you for more than two seconds at a time.

“Okayyyy..?” you respond, chuckling as you begin to walk more. What the fuck? Reid has never once cared about your feelings.

“Sorry if that weirded you out. Just wanted to make the unsub think that I care about you.” Ah, there he was. The real Reid was back.

“No statistics about that?” You spat, sounding more hostile that you intended to.

“No,” he deadpanned. 

“However, I have watched more than a few romantic films with Garcia, and more often than not the love interests stop when they’re walking to confess some sort of feelings or to say something meaningful, and it would have helped the unsub to determine whether or not he wants to make us his next victims…” Reid started to ramble again.

You both got into the car, and before you knew it, you were at the safe house. Reid had taken a fairly direct route, with a few twists and turns here and there to see if anyone was following them. As it turns out, there was one blue honda accord following you around.

As you both exited the car to enter the safe house, you saw the car slowly pass by the house. You knew that they were probably going to sit outside the house for a while before attempting to break in. 

You headed into the house with Reid, holding the door open behind you for him. He closed the door behind him, making sure to lock it.

“Now that that’s over with,” you began with a chuckle, and he laughed with you.

“Now, I don’t think it was that bad l/n, do you?” Spencer turned his head to give you a smirk, and you rolled your eyes. He could be so cocky when he wanted to. 

You followed him into the living room, noticing almost immediately that the windows were very large. Almost impulsively, you went to close the curtains, but Reid grabbed your wrist, and pulled you so that you faced him.

“If you close the windows, they’re going to think we know something. This unsub is extremely perceptive, y/n. You see that blue car across the street out there?” he asks. You nod without looking, and he continues. 

“That’s him. He’s waiting to see if we’re the right ‘couple’ to fill out his fantasy.” You nodded again, only noticing how close you two had gotten when you felt his hands rest on your waist. 

“Reid what-” you mumble, but he cuts you off with more of his rambling about the unsub.

“This type of unsub is far from stupid, they can’t be tricked very easily. But it can be done, we just have to play our cards right. And if we do, we’ll catch him. We just have to hope he doesn't change his MO on us, or else we’ll be in deep shit,” Reid smiles sweetly, his facial expression the opposite of the words that just came out of his mouth.

“You think we’ve done enough to convince him?” You ask, snaking your arms around his back. 

You’re closer than you have ever been to this man, close enough to smell his cologne and feel his body radiate heat through his sweater vest. You find yourself leaning into his embrace until you both hear a crash at the back door.

You both immediately break apart, faces equally red from both the heat of you being so close, and from embarrassment. Reid pushes you behind him protectively and you scoff. He knows that you can take care of yourself just fine. 

You push past his arm, eyeing him, and he backs away from you sheepishly. You both make no movement to investigate the crash, deciding that you should let the team catch the unsub. Quietly, you take out your phone with one hand, and place your other on your gun. You dial Hotch’s number, and he picks up immediately. 

He says that you’re on speaker phone, and you nod. Remembering that he can’t see you, you whisper to the team. 

“The unsub is breaking in at the back door. Either that or it could be a diversion to get us away from one another,” you whisper into the phone.

“He’s already starting? His MO is changing. We need to go in there now,” Morgan says sternly, but Hotch disagrees. 

“If we arrest him with no evidence that he’s the unsub, we won’t be able to detain him for anything.” Hotch argues, and the rest of the team inevitably agrees. 

Getting evidence doesn’t last long though, as you see something move in the kitchen from the corner of your eyes. 

“I don’t think that’s going to be a problem, Hotch,” you squeak as you feel a cold blade placed on your throat.

“Go, ahead, missy. Tell your ‘Hotch’ that you’re going to die right now. Let’s see how long it takes police to get here,” the unsub says. He has a dark, gruff voice.

You freeze, and are barely able to speak. 

“Hotch?” you whisper.

“We’re coming, l/n. Hold tight,” he says, and then all you hear was a dial tone.

“Okay, that’s enough,” the unsub growls, and smacks the phone out of your hand with his free arm. You yelp a little bit, part from wanting him to think you were just an ordinary victim, and part from you actually being a bit frightened. 

“Hey man,” Reid says, probably trying to draw the unsubs attention away from you.

“Don’t ‘hey man’ me, okay?” the unsub yells, and Reids expression falters a bit.

“You don’t wanna kill her. You want to kill me first, right?” Reid argues, and you feel the unsub tense from behind you.

“You don’t want to kill her until you’re done with her, aren’t I correct ? So let go of her, and come get me,” he continues, trying to get the unsub to back down from you. 

“Go into the kitchen. Right now. Grab a knife or I swear to god i’ll kill her!” the unsub shouts, tears now rolling down your face.

Reid slowly walks to the kitchen, struggles finding a knife but eventually does. He walks back into the living room, slowly, and shows the unsub that he has the knife.

“Now,” the unsub starts, “Place the tip of the knife on your abdomen,” he orders Reid, and he does as the man tells him to. You hold back a sob, not wanting to see a teammate die in front of you without being able to do anything about it (even if it was your least favorite member).

Suddenly, both the front and back doors are kicked in.

“FBI! Drop your weapon, both of you! Now!” Hotch yells, and the knife Reid was holding clatters to the ground. The unsub looks around frantically, seeing that his options were limited. He was surrounded by officers and agents with guns, he couldn’t take the risk. 

Reluctantly, he let his blade clatter to the ground. Almost immediately, he is taken by Hotch and Morgan, and you run into Emily’s arms. She hugs you tightly, telling you that you’re safe now. Both you and Spencer are whisked off in different directions, into different paramedic vehicles. 

Neither of you see the other until you’re sitting on the jet across from each other. You find yourself glancing at him more often than you should have, and curse yourself for it. Little do you know, he was cursing himself for the exact same reason.

Once back at the BAU, you don’t even head inside the office. You wave goodbye to Hotch and Rossi, and they wave back. Penelope runs out and suffocates you, and then Reid in a bone crushing hug. Morgan pats you on the back, and gives you a wink. Emily and JJ are all over you, but you assure them for the umpteenth time that you are alright to spend the night alone. 

You lock eyes with Reid, breaking the contact after only a few seconds to head to your car. 

On the drive home, you still can’t seem to forget about how hot his breath had felt when you were close, or the feeling of his hands on your waist. 

What the fuck was wrong with you? You asked yourself, unlocking the front door to your apartment. 

You threw your bag down and almost immediately crashed, still wondering why your brain was acting the way it was.


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter is way shorter than the other one but hopefully the next chapter will make up for that hehe. also please ignore any big grammar errors its like 4am LMAO anyways thanks for reading!!

You arrive at the bureau the next morning in a trance, barely able to stay awake. You had barely gotten any sleep last night, and it was driving you crazy. You slumped into the break room, desperate for some caffeine to wake you up.

Making your coffee, you heard another person enter the dimly lit room. Not having enough energy to check who it was, you managed to mumble a short “Hey,” before quickly being crushed in a hug.

“I barely got to see you last night after you got back from the case!” You immediately recognized the owner of the voice, it was Penelope. You turned around and mumbled a few incoherent words, and she frowned.

“What’s goin’ on, lovebug?” She said in her signature motherly and concerning tone.

“Just a bit tired,” you managed to say, turning back around once the coffee had finished brewing. 

“Just a bit?” she questions, obviously not convinced by your statement.

“I couldn’t sleep last night, like at all,” you tell her truthfully. 

“Something on your mind?” she responds.

“Are you sure you’re a technical analyst, and not a profiler in disguise?” you laugh, and she laughs with you. 

“I’m sure,” she manages to say through her chuckles. “But don’t avoid the question, y/n. Are you alright, and so you want to talk about it?” she asks, a worried tone lacing her words. 

“I’m not, but i’ll get over it. I need to if I want to keep this job,” you chuckle, but you only earn a sad smile from Garcia as a response. 

You turn around to keep fixing your coffee, adding copious amounts of cream and sugar to mask the bitterness of the cheap breakroom coffee.

You hear another person enter the room, but don’t bother to check who it is. Anyone arriving to the office this early was bound to be just as sleep deprived as yourself. 

Stirring your coffee, you overhear Garcia greet them, likely the same way she greeted you. She loved everyone in this office, especially your close-knit team. 

“Why is everyone so sleepy today?” Penelope complains, and you gather that the person who walked in probably looked just as tired as you.

“Reid, you’re never this tired! What’s up?” She questions the said third party, finally naming them. 

You were now wide awake. 

You cough on nothing, and pick up the steaming hot mug of coffee.

“Well, um, i-i’m gonna go ahead and, um, go finish up some, uh- paperwork!” you stumble over your words, figuring out a decent excuse and flying out of the break room as fast as your legs would let you. 

Penelope just stood in the break room, perplexed at the situation that had just occurred. Spencer, luckily for you, didn’t even notice who had just run out of the little room. 

Ten minutes later, you were all seated at the round table, waiting for JJ to come in and inform you about a new case. 

Seated next to Morgan and Emily, you fiddle with your nails, impatiently wondering where JJ was so that the team could get to work.

“Okay, I'm just gonna say it since everyone is thinking it,” Morgan pipes up. You look up from your hands and over to Derek, genuinely not knowing what he was going on about.

“Reid? Y/L/N?” He says, and you both furrow your eyebrows in response. 

“Yes?” You respond, since Spencer obviously wasn’t going to say anything.

“What is going on with you two?” He asks another question, and you try to keep from widening your eyes.

“What?” You say, stunned on how they could notice that something was up that quickly. Then again, you do work with profilers after all.

“Don’t play with me, guys,” Morgan says.

“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Reid finally speaks up with an exasperated tone. 

Derek looks over to you for confirmation, and you just shrug your shoulders in response.

“You two are always pestering and arguing with each other over the smallest things, and at any moment you’re able to. Before working cases, after working cases, hell, sometimes even during cases if you’re really trying to get on each other's nerves. Y/n, why aren’t you criticizing Spencer's hairstyle or choice of shoes today? And you, why aren’t you sarcastically correcting her on her use of terminology, or telling her the actual meaning of life or some shit? What the fuck is going on? You’re silent, and that never happens,” Morgan finally finishes his rant, and you just sit there, stunned.

You open your mouth to reply, coming up with some sarcastic remark about how he never shuts up either, but in that moment JJ walks in with case files and you snap your jaw shut.

“We’ve got a difficult one today, folks,” she says, and you thank whatever greater power there is out there for saving you from a conversation that you did NOT want to have right now.

In the conference room, she briefs you all on a serial killer who is raping elderly women, and then murdering them painlessly. It was like no other murderer that you had seen, the killer didn’t torture their victim, or even kill them painfully.

“They put sleeping pills in their drink, rape them while they’re intoxicated but still alive, and then inject them with an overdose of heroine,” JJ reads from the case file.

“It sounds like the killer almost regrets what he’s doing, like he has some sort of remorse for his victims,” you pipe up, expecting to be shot down by Reid. Instead, he simply nods and says nothing. 

“That’s exactly what I was just thinking,” Emily chimes in, and you look at her with a small smile.

The team then loads onto the jet, and heads to Jacksonville, Florida to catch the killer.

Five hours later, you were all standing in the Jacksonville PD office, and had narrowed the suspect list down to two men.

“There is no way it could be Johnson,” you attest Hotch for the umpteenth time. You had been arguing over the identification of the unsub for the past ten minutes or so, and you were running out of time. The unsub was going to kill again soon, so you had to make the right decision or else another woman was going to lose her life. 

“Then explain to me how it could be Lopez,” he rebuttals. You roll your eyes and clench your fists, getting ready to explain yourself again when Rossi interrupts.

“At this point we have no more time to fight about this anymore,” he says rubbing his eyes with his pointer finger and thumb.

“Then what do you propose we-“ you ask, but you are cut off.

“We need to separate into two groups and go to both suspects houses,” he says, and you begin to protest when another voice speaks up.

“I agree. Emily and Rossi, you guys go with Hotch to Johnson's apartment. Morgan and JJ, come with y/n and I,” Spencer says, and ultimately everyone just goes with it.

As you walk to the SUVs, you toss Reid the keys. He looks at you with confusion, and tosses the keys back at you. 

“If you wanted to come with me you could have just asked,” you say, smiling. He feigns confusion, and you continue.

“But you’re driving,” you say as you wink at him and give him the keys again. Wait. Wink? You winked at him? Hold on.

Reid just stares at you. Then all of a sudden he walks over and forces the car keys into your hands.

“No,” he states, and climbs into the passenger side seat. You sigh, and start up the vehicle as soon as everyone is ready. 

You arrive at the Lopez household and Morgan knocks on the door. When there is no response, he yells. “Ricardo Lopez, this is the FBI! We have a warrant to search the premises!” No one responds, so he kicks the door in.

You search the house, ultimately finding Lopez and his sixth victim in his basement. You were right, and you were gonna have a field day with Hotch when you saw him again.

By the time you get Lopez into police custody and the victim back to the safety of her family, it nears 7pm. The whole team says their goodbyes to the police department and victim, and loads up into the SUVs to go back to the airport.

You don’t notice who you ended up sitting with in the backseat until they lean over to you, and you smell their cologne.

“What was that?” Spencer asks, clearly talking about your actions that happened before the arrest you had just made.

“What was what,” you say, not really knowing yourself either.

“You know what I’m talking about,” he growls. He clearly wasn’t amused with your ‘confusion’.

“No, I don’t,” you say, while trying not to laugh.

He opens his mouth to speak again, but you arrive at the airport and are saved by the sound of Morgan telling you to get out of the vehicle.

You dash to your seat on the jet and pull out your earbuds, hoping the two hour flight would be peaceful.

You wake up in a daze, as someone shakes your left shoulder. 

“Y/n. Y/nnnnn. Y/n!” The person successfully snaps you out of your sleep-like trance, and you rub your eyes as you try to look at who was waking you up.

“We’re here,” JJ says, and you blink. You look around the jet, and everyone seems wide awake. You shift in your seat and take your earbuds out.

On the way back inside the office, you’re greeted by a chipper Penelope, and you pass her to drop off some files on your desks.

On your way back to meet with the team, Emily suddenly waves you over.

“Y/n!! Drinks? Dancing? Yes?!” she asks enthusiastically, and you don’t want to decline her offer even though you’re tired.

“Why not,” you say, and the team cheers.

“To drinks!” Garcia says, and you all file out the doors to go to the nearest bar.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> tbh I expected this to get like zero reads, so thank you all so much for every kudos and comment. they mean so much to me. also I'm gonna try to stick to a posting schedule, once every two days or so. comment ideas or suggestions, or just feedback! ily :))

**Author's Note:**

> I have plans for at least 10 chapters but pleeeease feel free to comment suggestions or ideas like fr ya'll are so much more creative than me


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